Lightning Bolt
by PresleyRox
Summary: A/U Arnold is about two years older than Helga, so they never met as children. Arnold was often Helga's saving grace in life, so what would her childhood have been like if Arnold hadn't been in it? Arnold meets Helga during his senior year in college. What is it about the feisty blonde that interests Arnold so much, especially when she wants nothing to do with him?
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen. I have no excuse. I know I shouldn't start anything new…Just blame it on my muse.

Summary: A/U Arnold is about two years older than Helga, so they never met as children. Arnold was often Helga's saving grace in life, what would her childhood have been life if Arnold hadn't been in it? Arnold meets Helga during his senior year in college. Just what is it about the feisty blonde that interests him so much, especially when she wants nothing to do with him?

**Lightning Bolt: Introduction **

Arnold Shortman was hot and clammy as he walked to his first Wednesday morning class. It was the first week of September and unseasonably warm. Normally by the first week of classes the weather had started to cool down a bit, but today he was wearing a t-shirt and shorts and was still sweating a little bit. It was his second day of classes of his senior year at Washington University and he was already counting down the days until he would finally graduate and welcome the real world with open arms. He was sick of death of school and he was more than ready to be done.

His first class of the day was a creative writing class he was more or less forced to take. While creating his schedule he realized he was an English credit short of graduating. He figured the class would be an easy A. Walking into class he noticed it was a small classroom with only a dozen or so desks. He took a seat at one of the only seats available. It was on in the second row third seat in. He shot the girl with light brown hair that sat to his right a quick smile as he sat down.

Arnold pulled out his notebook and pencil just before the class's professor, Simon Alexander, walked out of his office in the back corner of the class. "Good morning and welcome to Creative Writing." Simon, who looked to be in his mid to late thirties, sat down on top of his desk at the front of the classroom, "My name is Simon Alexander, you can all call me Simon. I know normally professors go through the syllabus on first day, but I'm not going to do that. You all can read. Go though it on your own time. I'll take a quick role call and we'll get started."

After taking role call Simon wrote three sentences on the white board, "Alright, these are prompts. You have fifteen minutes to write as much as you can about whichever one inspires you. This will give me a chance to take a look at your writing skills." He looked at his watch, "And we start….Now."

_She left the freeway and drove into a small town, where she stopped at the first restaurant she saw and ordered lunch._

_His college football team lost the game in the last thirty seconds left to play._

_I woke up in complete darkness._

Arnold chose the first one and began writing.

He stared at his notebook as the minutes passed by. He sighed heavily. He barely had two paragraphs written down. He glanced at the clock on the wall. There was still seven minutes left. He had his pencil in his hand, but he was not writing. He looked around to see if anyone is class was struggling with this. Most everyone else looked to be writing, though it looked like there were slowing down.

Everyone that is, except for one girl who was sitting diagonally in front of him. Her pencil glided along her paper without hesitation and it appeared she had no signs of slowing down. Looking at the back of her head Arnold found himself wondering what she looked like from the front. She had golden blonde hair scooped up into a pony tail and the straps of her pink tank top shows hints of tattoos on each shoulder. On her right shoulder a large black and gray rose that covered the entire top of her shoulder. On the back of her left shoulder there was a simple black arrow.

How the hell was she still writing? He noticed that her pencil movements had yet to slow down.

Suddenly the pencil stopped.

Slowly the girl turned and looked at him.

_Shit_, Arnold quickly looked down at this paper. She must have realized he was staring at her. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her glare at him before turning her attention back to her writing. Her pencil began to write at its previous pace.

She was really pretty, Arnold realized. Though he only saw her for a short moment he saw that she had the most beautiful blue eyes he had ever seen. They were dark blue and absolutely gorgeous.

"Alright, time is up."

Arnold looked down at what he had written. There were only about two paragraphs. He probably shouldn't have spent the last seven minutes of writing time ogling the blonde sitting in front of him.

"I'm looking forward to reading everyone's work." Simon said as he walked around collecting everyone's paper. Arnold saw that he paused at the blonde's desk as she handed him three pieces of paper. "Don't worry about length. When it comes to writing quality is more important than quantity." He stopped, seemingly skimming the first page of the blonde's writing prompt. "I have to say Miss…" He paused, looking the name on top of the paper. "Pataki, I am _really_ looking forward to reading your work." He smiled at her before continuing to collect everyone's paper.

At the end of class the other students cleared out fairly quickly. The blonde, whose last name was apparently Pataki, still remained as she packed up her things. Arnold took a deep breath before approaching her, "Hi." He greeted nervously.

She looked up at him as she swung her messenger bag over her shoulder. She shot him confused look. "Hi?" Her reply came out more as a question than a greeting.

"I'm Arnold."

"That's nice." She began to make her way out of the classroom.

"What's your name?"

"Why do you want to know? You want to put a name to the person you have been staring at the whole way through class?" She asked with a raised eyebrow as sped up her pace.

"Oh. You noticed that, huh?" Arnold asked nervously. He scratched the back of his neck as he followed her.

"It's kind of hard not to notice someone burning a hole in the back of your head with their eyes. Is there a reason why you are following me? I already think you are kind of a creep of staring at me. Following me isn't helping."

"Sorry about that. I just saw how much you were writing and…What prompt did you chose? I did the one about the girl at the restaurant." He paused, "I'm sorry for staring." Arnold apologized. "And for following you. I swear I'm not a creep. I just want to know your name."

Arnold didn't know what was wrong with him. He had never exactly been smooth with women, but it was never this bad. Now he suddenly felt he was fourteen trying to talk to a pretty girl for the first time. It had been a long time since he had been _this_ awkward around a girl.

The blonde stopped in her tracks. "Why?"

Arnold furred his eyebrows in confusion. "Why? Why what?"

"Why do you want to know my name?"

The question caught Arnold off guard. "I…That's what people do when they meet new people. You learn their name." He paused, "We're in the same class; I'll lean your name eventually." He argued, immediately regretting it. Why was he being so damn creepy? He didn't understand why he was pushing her so hard on this. She clearly didn't want to talk to him. He really didn't blame her, he was pretty sure he was creeping the hell out of her.

The blonde smiled, "Well enjoy the mystery until then." She waved, "I need to get to my next class. See ya around Football Head."

With those words she left him standing alone and confused. Who was this girl? And why did Arnold want to find out so badly?

Wait. Did she just call him Football Head?

_Seriously, who the hell was this girl?_


	2. Chapter 2

**Lightning Bolt**

Arnold saw her again later that day. She was sitting alone at a table at the edge of the quad. She was wearing an oversized pair of headphones that were connected to the laptop she was using. She would stop periodically to nibble on a sandwich. He looked around, since it was a particularly hot day there weren't too many other students outside for lunch. He figured most people opted for the comfort of the air conditioning in the cafeteria. There was the girl and a couple of other tables full of students chatting over their lunch.

"Hey man." His best friend since grade school, Gerald Johansson, snapped Arnold out his thoughts. "How's your day going?"

"Good." Arnold quickly answered. "It's going good. Thank God it's senior year though. I can't wait to be done."

"The girl you're staring at is kind of hot." Gerald stated as he took a seat at one of the tables closest to them. "You know her?"

Arnold said nothing as he sat down. Was he really being that obvious? Gerald knew right away he was staring at her and she knew he was staring at her in class. He sighed; he needed to work on his subtlety. He honestly hadn't mean to gawk at the blonde. "No. Not really." He finally answered. "She's in my creative writing class."

"You should tell her to come sit with us." Gerald suggested, "Or maybe we can go sit with her?" He grinned, "I can hook you up."

Arnold shook his head, "No." He quickly told him. "I kind of freaked her out earlier; I think talking to her now would creep her out even more."

Gerald raised a questionable eyebrow, "What did you do?"

"I kind of stared at her during class." He paused, "And then I kind of followed her out of class and tried to get her to tell me her name."

"You what?" Gerald blinked nearly wincing, "Dude. Seriously, you're lucky she didn't pepper spray you or something. Come on, you're not _that_ bad when it comes talking to girls. Why would you be that…"He paused, "I'm sorry to say it, but creepy?" He grabbed the sub sandwich off his lunch tray. "You weren't even that bad with Lila." He said before taking a large bite out of his sub. "Ugh, I forgot how the food here tastes like shit. How do they mess up a sub sandwich, seriously?" He mumbled before he continued to eat the subpar sandwich.

Arnold nearly groaned, "I don't know what's wrong with me. She just caught me off guard or something." He admitted as he picked up his own sandwich and taking a bite. "She called me Football Head." He said as he took a quick glance at the blond before quickly looking away. The last thing he wanted to do was creep her out even more than he already had.

Gerald burst out laughing, nearly spewing the drink of Yahoo soda he just took all over the table in front of him, "She called you _what_? You said Football Head, right? She called you Football Head?" Gerald was practically gasping for air as he continued to laugh, "That might be the funniest thing I have ever heard." He chucked as he finally calmed down, "She's kinda right, you know? After she pointed it out I can't not see it."

Frowning, Arnold felt the shape of his head. "No it's not." He tried to deny it, though he had the lingering suspicion that it was in fact true.

"She's coming this way." Gerald pointed out, "If you want I can act like a bigger creep than you so you can at least look a little bit better in her eyes." He looked at the blonde, "Actually…Wolfgang might be able to do that for me."

Arnold's frown deepened as he turned to see Wolfgang make his way towards the blonde as she walked towards the building. He had known Wolfgang for a few years and he was one of the biggest, if not the biggest, assholes he had ever met in his life.

"Hey Pataki!" Wolfgang's voice boomed through the quad. "Hey!" He yelled her last name again attempting to gain her attention.

To Arnold's surprise, the blonde, whose last name was Pataki, looked completely unfazed. She didn't even slow her speed even a little bit. Instead she flashed her middle finger and simply said, "Fuck off, Wolfgang." By this time Arnold and Gerald had been watching the scene from the sidewalk, laughing at the dumbfounded look across Wolfgang's face. They hadn't realized they were blocking the walkway until she stopped in front of them and snapped, "Move it, Football Head!"

Arnold and Gerald quickly moved out of the way, both men mustering a 'sorry' as she stomped away towards the school.

"Fucking bitch." Wolfgang muttered slightly louder than under his breath. "I don't know why I bother with her." Arnold suspected that Wolfgang knew exactly why he 'bothered' with her.

"You know her Wolfgang?" Gerald questioned, "What's her name?"

"Yeah, I know her." Wolfgang told them. "Her name's Helga. We grew up in the same neighborhood." He explained. "She is such bitch." He nearly spat before taking off in the opposite direction that Helga had.

"Well, your mystery woman has a name." Gerald told Arnold with a smirk, "She sure knows how to push Wolfgang's buttons."

"He called her a bitch." Arnold frowned. He didn't know why and he knew it probably shouldn't, but it kind of bothered him when people threw out the word 'bitch' out so easily.

Gerald shrugged, "Didn't seem to bother her much. Besides, it's Wolfgang. Are you really that surprised?"

Arnold sighed, "I suppose not." He checked the time on his cell phone, "I guess I should get to my next class. I'll see you later."

*  
It was Friday and Arnold had found himself excited to go to his creative writing class again. He had gotten over some of the anxiety he had been feeling and now he was just looking forward to see Helga again. He had even gotten to class rather early. So early that Helga was the only other person in the room. The first time he saw her she was wearing her hair in a simple pony tail, today her hair was down. Her hair had some natural curl in it with the blonde strands tumbling down her back.

She was sitting at the same seat she sat in during their first class and quietly leafing through the book for the class, seemingly making a few notes inside the book. Arnold swallowed nervously before taking the steps towards her. He took the seat directly to her right. "Hi Helga." He offered her a small smile.

To his surprise Helga didn't seem at all surprised that he now knew her name. "Football Head." She used the nickname she gave him two days earlier. She sighed, she didn't bother looking at him. She just continued to page through the course book. "I take it Wolfgang told you my name."

"Yea…He said you two are from the same neighborhood?"

"What else did he say?" Arnold noted there seemed to be a slight edge to her voice when she asked.

"Err…Nothing,"

Finally Helga looked into his direction. "You are a terrible liar."

"Um...Well…He just said that you were a…" He trailed off nervously.

"Bitch?" Helga finished for him and he nodded, "I figured as much." Arnold didn't noticed the sound of relief in her voice.

"I'm sorry he called you that."

Helga furred her eyebrows in confusion, "Why are _you_ sorry about that?"

"It's just…" Arnold stuttered, "He shouldn't have said that about you. It wasn't right. I'm just sorry he said that about you."

"That's just stupid." She simply stated. "Why would you ever apologize for what someone else says or does? That is just idiotic. Besides, you don't know me. I may very well be a bitch." A slight smirk played on her lips, "And like I give a shit what Wolfgang says. He is such a prick."

"I don't think you're a bitch." Arnold stated stubbornly.

Helga rolled her eyes, "You don't even know me." She muttered before turning her attention back to her book.

Arnold sighed, but said nothing before he started to take the things he needed out of his backpack. By this time other students had begun to file into the classroom. As hard as he tried Arnold couldn't stop himself to look in Helga's direction. It was then he noticed the two tattoos in her arms. She had one on each arm on the same spot below the inside of her elbows. On her left arm there was an open bird cage, on the right a flying bird.

He leaned towards her desk, "I like your tattoos." He whispered, in particularly gesturing to the ones on her arms.

Helga looked down at her tattoos. "Thanks." She muttered under her breath.

"How many do you have?" He asked curiously.

She smirked, "More than you can see now." Her smirk seemed to broaden when she noticed Arnold's cheeks turn red.

"Good morning." The class's professor, Simon greeted the class before Arnold could reply. "I really enjoyed reading everyone's prompts from the other day. Some of you have some real raw talent." Arnold couldn't help but notice he seemingly looked directly at Helga when he saw that. "Others of you will hopefully be able to greatly benefit from this class." He cleared his throat, "Now before I hand these back I would like to read an excerpt from one of my favorite pieces."

_"I woke up in complete darkness. I'm cold, but I'm sweating. I squint, struggling to make out any of my surroundings. I know I'm in a bed because I can feel the softness of blankets beneath me. I don't want to move because I don't know if I'm alone or not. My throat is dry, I desperately want water. I don't know where I am and I don't know where I can find water. I try to get up but my legs and arms feel heavy and as I try to get out of bed my legs cannot support my weight and I fall to the hardwood floor with a painful thump. I just lay there on the cool floor for a long while trying to clear the cloudiness from my mind that just won't go away." _

Arnold noticed Helga slumping down in her seat. She was biting down on her lower lip, looking down at her hands, a light pink blush spread across her cheeks. Realization hit him. Helga was the one who wrote that.

"Fantastic." Simon smiled widely, "Wonderful job Miss Pataki, I cannot wait to see what else you have in store for me." He handed her back her prompt, which Arnold could plainly see was three full pages long. "I wrote a few notes on everyone's prompts, mostly on things you are doing well or need work." He handed Arnold back his paper, "Today we are going to do a quick journal entry before we continue on with class."

Arnold basically stopped listening as he read Simon's comments about his prompt. They were mostly all negative. Actually each comment was about something Arnold needed to work on. Except for the last one, one that Arnold guessed that Simon wanted to leave him with at least something positive. _You have really good handwriting_, Arnold sighed; well at least he had that going for him. He had a feeling that this class wasn't going to be the easy A that he originally thought it would be.

* * *

As always, if you enjoyed, please review.


	3. Chapter 3

**Lightning Bolt Part Three**

The next few weeks passed by rather quickly. Arnold found himself looking forward to his creative writing class every Wednesday and Friday. Of course it wasn't because of the class itself. He looked forward to seeing Helga Pataki for one hour and five minutes two days a week. There was just something about the blonde girl that Arnold couldn't shake from his brain.

"Good morning Helga." Arnold greeted as he sat down in the seat next to her's. It was Wednesday and once again Helga was the first one in class. It was the firs? week of October and the temperature had really cooled off during the last week. Today Helga was wearing a plain gray long sleeved shirt and had a pink silky looking scarf wrapped around her neck. With her tattoos covered by her shirt he found himself missing them.

She sighed heavily, seemingly annoyed at the fact he acknowledged her and she was forced to acknowledge him back. "Mornin' Football Head."

"Hey, I got you say morning." Arnold grinned, happy with the accomplishment. Before that all he'd get out of her was the ridiculous she gave him. "We just need to and a good and then all we need to work on now is the name. It's Arnold, in case you forgot."

Helga smirked, turning to face him. "Oh, I didn't forget your name. I just like Football Head better. It suits you." She paused, "Or if you prefer I can all you 'Creeper' for staring at me all though class. I'll let you choose. Creeper or Football Head?"

"Err...Football Head is fine." Arnold felt his cheeks turn red. Was he really that obvious?

Helga laughed, "That's what I thought. And yes, you are that obvious." She smirked, answering the question Arnold never asked.

Arnold smiled, "You have a nice laugh."

"I'm going to stop you there." Helga held up her hand, "Look, it's pretty obvious that you think I'm attractive and I don't know, maybe you want to date me, or screw me, or do whatever with me, but I'm not interested. I'm here to go to school, not to play footsie with some pretty blonde boy."

"You just called me pretty." Arnold smiled at her teasingly.

She rolled her eyes, "Don't read too much into it Football Head."

"I'm not looking to date you." Arnold half lied, the truth was he didn't know what exactly he wanted from her. He just knew he wanted to be around her. "You know, there is this thing that some people do. It's called friendship."

"Friendship?" Helga questioned slowly, "What is this friendship you speak of?" She rolled her eyes, "Yeah, I'm sure those have been friendship stares you have been giving me. It turns out you haven't been undressing me with your eyes. I guess you were just, what, putting more clothes on me?"

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't find you attractive, because, well, look at you. But if you aren't interested I won't pursue you. I'm just asking you to maybe be open to the possibility of being friends."

"Why do you want to be friends with me anyway? Is it my charming personality? It's my charming personality isn't it?"

"Honestly, I don't know." Arnold told her truthfully. "I just want to get to know you I guess. I can't really explain why. Look, my birthday is this weekend." Arnold paused, expecting her to ask when it was or happy wish him a happy birthday, or even how old he was going to be. Of course, she didn't. He didn't know why he was surprised. "I'm having a little party at this bar and…"

"I'm not 21." Helga quickly in him off. "Besides, I work all weekend so I wouldn't be able to go even if I wanted to."

"Who said I wanted you to come?" Arnold asked trying to save at least a little bit of his ego; Helga shot him a knowing look. He smiled, "Okay, you got me. Of course I wanted you to come. "Where do you work?"

"It's this little place. You make have heard of it. It's called it's none of your business." She smirked, "Come on, you don't think I'd make this whole friendship thing easy for you did you?"

Arnold grinned, "Are you saying we're friends?"

"Not quite. I'd say we're somewhere between acquaintance and a couple of notches below full blown friendship."

Arnold nodded, chuckling softly, "I'll take it."

"How wonderful, my star student is already here." Simon greeted Helga with a smile. His smile faltered for just a moment when he saw Arnold, before returning. "And Arnold. It's nice to see you both." He took a seat on top of his desk, as he did every class. "How are you two doing with the writing assignment?"

"Er…It's getting there. I guess." Arnold scratched the back of his neck nervously. Simon had assigned a short fiction assignment the previous Wednesday and it was due Friday. It was pretty much finished, but even Arnold knew it was terrible.

"I just edited it and made the finishing touches last night, so I'm all done." Arnold watched as Helga beam proudly.

"I look forward to reading it." Simon smiled before pausing, "Yours too Arnold." He added quickly, but less enthusiastically.

"Thanks." Arnold muttered. It was obvious Helga was his favorite student. It was impossible not to see it. He supposed he didn't really blame him. He knew Simon had written a few books so it was only natural for him to favor a fellow writer. Though he hadn't heard or read much of Helga's work the things he did here were absolutely brilliant. After that second day in class Simon started to read exports of someone's work, he never said the name, just calling the author Anonymous, but Arnold knew it wrote it. Helga would always visibly shrink into her chair and her cheeks would turn pink. Really, it was kind of cute. Okay, she was really cute.

Arnold forced himself not to look at her through the rest of class. This whole staring thing was getting way out of hand. He was finally getting her to come around on the whole friend's thing; the last thing he wanted to do was scare her off.

"Why aren't you in class?" Arnold asked as he threw his backpack on the floor of his dorm room. His roommate was Gerald Johanssen, his best friend since grade school.

"Got cancelled." Gerald answered from his twin bed. He was spread out on the bed and had a magazine with half naked women in it laid out in front of him.

Arnold scrunched his nose, "I am so glad you don't have your hand down your pants right now."

"Come on, you'd know I'd least put a sock on the door or something if I was doing that." Gerald joked, flipping the page of the magazine.

"Do you think Phoebe would like the fact you look at those magazines?"

"She's like two thousand miles away. I wouldn't blame her for looking at these kinds of magazines, but you know, with guys, or whatever. Besides it's not like I'm touching, just looking. So how'd it go? Did you ask that hot girl to your party yet?"

"Her name is Helga." Arnold reminded Gerald yet again what the 'hot girl's' name was. "I did, but she's not twenty one and she said she has to work all weekend."

"Too bad. Well I hear the bar has a pretty hot bartender that works the weekend, so maybe she'll help you take your mind off Helga."

Arnold nodded, "Yeah, maybe."

It was Saturday night and Arnold's twenty second birthday. He was meeting some of his friends at _The Red Door_, named simply for the bar's red door was a bar that was located few miles off campus. Rumor had it that a really hot bartender worked there on the weekends. Arnold was all for checking out a hot bartender. It was something he had hoped would get Helga out of his brain.

As soon as he entered the bar he knew that was simply impossible. He immediately saw the blonde bartender mixing a drink for a costumer.

He sighed heavily; of course _she_ had to be the hot bartender.

So sorry it has been so long since I updated. Real life can just get in the way, you know? Anyway, as always, if you enjoyed please review.


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